The Purge of the Red
by SociallyInept
Summary: The girls get tired of Jean lording her naturally luscious red hair over them. Fanfic 100 Challenge "Red"
1. Plotting the Deed

Title: The Purging of the Red

Fandom: X-Men: Evolution  
Characters: X23, Jean, mansion females, Kurt

Prompt: # , Red  
Word Count:  
Rating: G  
Summary: The girls get tired of Jean lording her naturally luscious red hair over them.

Part 1

"She's got to go," Rogue yelled at Kitty as she stomped into their room. Laura and Kitty watched from Kitty's bed as Rogue yanked a drawer open, snatched her brush out of it, and started dragging it through her brown and white hair with unnecessary force.

"What's got to go, Rogue?" Kitty asked while finishing the French braid she was doing to Laura's black hair.

"Jean! I can't do it anymore! She was in there absolutely flaunting that stupid red hair everywhere. It was an insult, I just know it! We need to get rid of her." Rogue threw the brush back in the drawer and sat down hard on Kitty's bed, nearly knocking Laura and Kitty off in the process.

"Watch it," Laura muttered, clinging to the footboard. Kitty straightened up and put herself between the two.

"I know it bothers you, remember how Tabby gets angry about it too? But we're not getting rid of Jean just because she has awesome hair. That's silly. That would be like getting rid of Kurt because he sheds in the pool, or Laura for being herself." Kitty patted Rogue's arm sympathetically.

Laura said nothing, just scowled a little harder and glared at the furniture. Footsteps grew in the hall, and then Jubilee peeped around the corner, trailed by Rahne.

"Are you guys talking about Jean? You know yesterday she borrowed my sunglasses- you know, the yellow ones?- and she totally pulled the look off better than me. I got so angry I just had to leave the room and shoot off some fireworks."

"Who, Jean?" Tabby and Amara appeared from the opposite direction and joined the rapidly growing group. "What's going on now?"

"Jean was brushing her hair at me again," Rogue complained, waving them all in. Rahne shut the door behind them as they entered and seated themselves around the room.

"Urgh! Yes! I found one of her hairs in my laundry yesterday," Tabby said from her perch on Rogue's bed. "I want to do something to Miss 'Yes it's my natural color'. Like cut it off."

"No, we can't do that! I think that's why Scott goes out with her," Amara said in alarm. "I don't want to be responsible for their relationship failing!"

Rogue snorted. "Oh, please. They're the same person. I think if one of them tripped the other one would too."

"Besides," Tabby smirked. "We're all redheads to Scott anyway."

"Oh, that's not funny," Rahne said.

"Then stop laughing," Tabby replied smugly.

"I just don't know how much longer I can put up with this," Rogue sighed. "Is she like this when she's alone?"

"Hey, yeah. Laura, your bed's in Jean's room. What's she like without the rest of us?" Jubilee asked.

Laura stopped scowling and looked up in alarm. "Don't drag me into this, I'm still in trouble from that other thing."

"See, I don't really care. Does Jean sit around and stare at herself in the mirror, or style her hair or something?" Rogue asked, crossing her arms.

"Or try stuff that one of the rest of us totally did? Like stealing my look?" Jubilee asked. Laura shifted. The answer to all the questions was 'yes', but she wasn't going to say anything. It honestly didn't bother her. Yes, Jean's hair was amazing, but at least Laura could keep a tan. That trumped good hair.

"I bet it's really soft, Jean's hair. Does she do anything before bed, like wrap it up or something?" someone asked.

"Oh, I have it!" Tabby interrupted, bouncing up and down on Rogue's bed (causing Amara to fall off behind it). Laura sighed to herself when the attention shifted. So far, so good. There's only so many times she can get in trouble each month before the Professor started having words with her, and the quota was dangerously near much earlier this month than usual. "We'll dye it!"

There was a collective gasp around the room.

"Dye…Jean's hair?" Amara said as she climbed back onto the bed. "That's so…."

"Genius," Rogue finished, grinning. "I'll put a couple dollars in for that cause."

"Me too!"

"Me too!"

"I really don't think this is such a great idea," Rahne said. "I'm a redhead too, you know."

"Yes, but your hair's too wiry to be jealous of. You use pet shampoo." Jubilee said. Rahne stuck her tongue out at her.

"No, we can't dye Jean's hair!" Kitty cried out, waving her arms frantically to get attention. "Because whatever color we dyed it would be like a challenge. I refuse to have to put up with a brunette Jean, she'd leave me in the dust!"

Laura sighed and slowly slid off the bed, trying to be as quiet as possible. She needed to be far away when this plan was fully hatched. This is why she hung out with the boys, they didn't plot elaborate revenges against each other.

"Oh, good point," Amara said. "Let's dye Jean's hair as long as it isn't to brown."

"Or black! She can steal my shades but she will never steal my hair color!" Jubilee said angrily, hitting the arm of the computer chair with her fist.

"Oh, good point. We can't do blonde either. Not that I totally couldn't pull it off better than Miss Prim-and-Proper, but- hey, where are you going?" Tabby said, pointing at Laura. She took a glance around the room and bolted for the door.

"I refuse to be part of this!" she cried, almost touching the knob before Rahne tackled her and Amara leaned against the door.

"Quick, knock her out or something!" Rahne garbled from a half wolf, half human throat.

"Get off me or I'll hurt you! I've done it before!" Laura said, trying to get the werewolf off her without actually hurting her or breaking anything. Rogue got up to absorb her and thereby knock her out.

There was a knock on the door, and everybody froze and stared with wide eyes as the door tried to open. Amara leaned against it harder and it shut again.

"Hey, cut it out!" a male voice said. "Honestly, the one time I try to use a door and it's slammed in my face!"

"Oh, it's Kurt," Kitty said. "Should we let him in?"

"Might as well," Rogue sighed and sat back down on the bed, "He'll come in anyway."

Amara stepped away from the door and opened it, revealing a very confused Kurt standing awkwardly. "Well? Get in here!"

He raised an eyebrow but entered, and the door slammed shut again immediately after he was completely inside the room. He saw Rahne laying on top of Laura in the corner and looked around. "Am I missing something?"

"We're going to dye Jean's hair," Kitty said helpfully. Kurt glanced back at Rahne and Laura.

"Are you sure?"

Rahne blushed and slid off Laura, changing entirely back to human. Laura sat up and grumbled, scooting away from the corner.

"So what do you think would look the worst on Jean? Blonde? Grey?" Jubilee said.

"We should just shave her," Tabby yawned.

"Whoa," Kurt said, raising his arms and backing towards the door, "I'm not going to be a part of this, cleaning the X-Jet for a month isn't worth that."

There was a general groan around the room, and an unspoken agreement to launch an estrogen attack on the only present male.

Jubilee jumped up and put one of her arms through Kurt's while Rahne did the other, and they led him baffled away from the door.

"Um, why do you want to mess with Jean?" he managed to get out, suddenly acutely aware that he was outnumbered by the female sex.

"See, you don't have to put up with the sort of thing girls do. Everything is a competition with us," Tabby explained.

"No, someone else talk. It always sounds like a great idea coming from you," Kurt said, "This is not a good idea at all."

Laura crept the few remaining feet to the door as the girls explained about Jean's insolent hair attitude, and slowly reached up to the knob. As they swung Kurt slowly around to their point of view, she swung the knob slowly around and opened the door, getting a view of the hall. She glanced back toward the group, which was still focused on Kurt, and inched the door open a little further.

"Hey! Laura!" someone said angrily, but it was too late, she was off, bolting down the hall as fast as she had on any mission. Except that this time, there was no mission. The idea was to stay away from the trouble and not be told words by the Professor. She randomly ran down halls, turning whenever the opportunity presented itself. She leapt onto the railing and slid down the banister in her socks, and-

-Kurt caught her at the bottom and teleported them right back into Rogue and Kitty's room, where the girls who had chased her were returning.

"It's too late to back out now," Rogue said with irritation.

"I was never in on this, you started before I could leave," Laura pointed out, shoving her way out of Kurt's grasp.

"Wow," Jubilee said between gasps for breath, "teleporting is the best."

"I hope no one heard that," Kitty said nervously, peeking out the door down the hall in each direction.

"I'll scream," Laura said, glancing at other escape routes.

"No, listen. We'll make this fun and hard to pin on one person," Tabby said, "I'm a pro at this sort of thing. We need to go shopping, right, and we'll go find a hair dye that would look horrible on Miss Jean, and then tonight when she's asleep we'll sneak in and dye it. Is she a heavy sleeper, Laura?"

Laura sighed and stared longing at the window. It didn't really matter if she tried to escape, not with a teleporter around. And if she killed Kurt she'd be in a lot of trouble, more than just dying someone's hair. The very first rule Logan and the Professor had agreed upon for her was "Do not kill fellow students.

"Yes," she growled.

"Fabulous," Tabby grinned, and the other girls grinned with her.


	2. Buying the Dye

Title: The Purging of the Red, Part 2

Fandom: X-Men: Evolution  
Characters: X23, Jean, mansion females

Prompt: # , Red  
Word Count:  
Rating: G  
Summary: The girls get tired of Jean lording her naturally luscious red hair over them.

"Shh!" someone giggled.

"Quiet, she may hear us," Rogue muttered, slapping at the wall by the door blindly until the switch flipped on, illuminating the garage.

"Which car are we taking?" Kurt asked quietly, scanning what was available.

"I guess Jean's van. It's the only one big enough for all of us," Kitty said. The girls of the X-Men and Kurt quietly snuck over to the nondescript grey van.

"I'm driving," Kurt said, opening the front door.

"What, why? I just got my license, I can drive," Kitty whispered indignantly.

"Because we want to live," Tabby said, shoving Laura into the van and following, "Amara, help me pin her down."

"I'm the only guy here, and this is sort of awkward for me since I already have a wonderful girlfriend. The least you could do is let me drive to make up for it." Kurt gently pushed Kitty towards the back seats, and hopped in the driver's seat. Rogue, who as conspirator got shotgun, manually opened the garage door to avoid bringing attention to their departure. Once Kurt had eased the van onto the long driveway, Rogue shut the garage door and hopped in.

It only took about twenty minutes to get to the mall thanks to the lack of traffic on the roads at this time of morning, but the mall was busy.

"So what are the odds of someone recognizing us? Isn't Ms. Munroe out today too? What if she sees us?" Amara wondered out loud.

"Sees us what, buying hair dye? We'd just get a small lecture on our natural beauty and maybe a slushie or something. We're just a bunch of teenage girls at a mall. It's a great disguise because it's true. Plus she's at the grocery store." Tabby replied. Laura followed them with an air of resignation, trying to ignore the nasty fast food smells and noise. Since it was a mall, some quick obligatory shopping was done, but the girls (leading Kurt and Laura) were quick to converge in one of the small general stores in one of the mall's many halls.

"Okay, so what color do we want to get? Pretty much every available shade is here somewhere." Rogue muttered, slowly pacing the aisle studying all the options.

"Here's a boring dirty blonde," Rahne said. Rogue and Tabby glanced at it for a moment and dismissed it just as quickly.

"No, we want something…worse," Tabby muttered, "Since we can't just shave her. It has to be a color that few people would want, and the few that do get it would never be able to pull it off because it's so ugly…."

Laura felt her eyes drawn to a certain color against her will. She tried to look away before anyone else saw what color she was staring at, but it was too repulsive to look away from. Jubilee noticed her stare and looked at the dye.

"Oh…guys, this one!" she said happily, snatching the box off the shelf and waving it in the air. Laura slapped herself in disappointment as several of the girls patted her back in congratulations.

"Good job, Laura," Rogue said, gently taking the box from Jubilee and almost caressing it, "Tonight, when Jean's asleep, we have work to do."

They finished their shopping with an air of triumph and got back to the mansion just in time for dinner.

At dinner, the intended victim of their plot chatted comfortably with them about school and life in general, unconsciously making some of the girls wonder if going through with the plan was such a great idea. Jean wasn't a mean person. She was nice, and aside from a tendency to get all the New Mutant girls the same jewelry for Christmas each year, was thoughtful and generally a good person. It could be argued that she had few flaws, one of them being her tendency to assume others saw things the way she did, and another being that when she was around it was easier to actually enjoy being friends with her, while when she was gone it was too plain to see several of her personality flaws.

Which is why once dinner ended the girls, Laura, and Kurt had to have a huddle in Tabby and Amara's room.

"I don't think we should go through with this," Rahne said nervously. "Jean may have better hair than all of us put together, but she's really nice. I don't think she's aware of it."

"What are you talking about? I've been living with her longer than the rest of you except Kitty, so I can say this with confidence. Jean Grey knows exactly how pretty she is, and she's not afraid to use it when it suits her." Rogue said firmly.

"I think that someone is going to wake up with ugly hair in the morning regardless of what's decided here. This sounds like a lot of fun," Tabby said, studying her nails casually.

"What are you talking about, you don't even know where we hid the dye," Jubilee said, "Only Rahne and I know where it is for security purposes, remember?"

"Where is it?" Tabby asked.

"In my sock drawer- oh, man!" Jubilee sat down and sulked.

"We're going through with this," Rogue said confidently. "She looked right at me and flipped her hair during dinner."

"When was that?" Kurt asked, distracted from staring out the window.

"Right after we ran out of potatos. You didn't see it? It was a huge hair flip!"

"I want to be one of the ones with my fingers in her hair when the dye sets in," Tabby said dramatically, standing up.

"Of course. You hate Jean's hair just as much as I do," Rogue nodded, "So the two of us will do it. The rest of you will be on lookout or something."

"What about Laura?" Kitty asked. Laura scowled at the desk she was sitting on.

"Laura's going to be sound asleep in Logan's room," Laura said, "And therefore not be in trouble with the rest of you tomorrow. Unless Jean kills you and hides the bodies before the Professor is awake."

"Logan lets you stay in his room?" Jubilee asked in surprise.

"Stay on topic here," Rogue snapped her fingers in Jubilee's face. "You're going to tell us when she's asleep so we can start the dying. I dyed my hair once in middle school and it took almost an hour to get done."

"You used to dye your hair?" Jubilee asked in surprise again.

"Focus," Tabby cried out in exasperation.

There was a knock at the door, and Bobby popped his head in. "It's movie night, people. Are you going to watch with us? Dr. McCoy picks tonight, and he's thinking one of those "Friday Night Lights" types of movies. Or "The Replacements". Not sure. What are you all doing in here, anyway?"

"Um, yeah. Sure. We'll be down in a minute, Bobby. We just need to…finish something," Rogue said.

"Throw some extra popcorn in," Kurt said lightly. Bobby glanced around once more, then shook his head and left, muttering about how weird girls and Germans are.

"Okay, here's the plan," Rogue said, and quickly went over the details with the group until each member knew their roles by heart, then they went downstairs to enjoy the movie and pass the time until Jean went to sleep.


	3. Creation of a Public Enemy

Title: The Purging of the Red, Part 3

Fandom: X-Men: Evolution  
Characters: X23, Jean, mansion females

Prompt: # , Red  
Word Count:  
Rating: G  
Summary: The girls get tired of Jean lording her naturally luscious red hair over them.

"Tomorrow Scott's taking me to see a movie, and then we're going to dinner," Jean said happily, rifling through one of about seven shopping bags thrown across her bed. "I got a new sundress just for the occasion."

Laura said nothing, as was routine when both she and Jean were in the room at the same time. The French braid Kitty had put her hair in had made her hair wavy, and she was trying to straighten it out with a brush. When her hair wasn't straight it made her look sweet, and she saw no point in pretending.

"I'm thinking I should do something special with my hair. When I tried the dress on in the store I pulled it up into a sloppy bun and it looked amazing. Should I do that?"

She fixed her hair up into said sloppy bun and studied the results. "Hmm… Oh, that reminds me. Did I see you at the mall earlier?"

Laura focused on her disobedient hair and continued to say nothing just a little louder this time.

"Yeah, that's a stupid question. You hate the mall. Sorry. I just feel sort of paranoid today, I guess. Is something going to happen?" Jean let her hair down in a cascade of red that a shampoo commercial model would be jealous of and frowned slightly at Laura. "Get it wet, it'll help straighten it out."

She tossed a small spray bottle at Laura, who caught it without looking and began squirting her hair while she yanked at it with the brush. It did start straightening out. After it was suitably flat again she looked up at Jean, who was hanging her new clothes up in the closet, humming to herself.

"I think…." She started, and trailed off. She reached under her bed for Mr. Cuddles (though she pretended he had no name), the battered, abused, Frankensteinian teddy bear she'd rescued for moral support.

"Hmm?" Jean looked over at her. "Did you say something?"

"No." Laura muttered, then straightened up. " I mean yes. Is there somewhere else you could go for awhile? Like for tonight?"

Jean paused with a hanger in her hands. "What do you mean? Why?"

"Oh…damn. I need to weight this out a little more. Go back to your clothes." Laura waved one of her hands at the small pile on Jean's bed. Jean glanced at the pile, and at her roommate, and then went and sat down on Laura's bed facing her.

"I'm not being paranoid, am I? What's going to happen?" she asked gently, picking up the brush from where Laura had sat it down and starting brushing the rest of the knots out of the younger girl's hair that she had missed.

Laura groaned in frustration and shifted on the bed. "Do you like being a redhead?" she asked after a few minutes.

Jean raised an eyebrow, "Yes. That's why I haven't cut it or anything."

Laura sat still for a few minutes while Jean worked a large knot out, then said slowly, "How much do you like being a redhead?"

The brush paused mid-stroke. "They wouldn't." she said flatly, then resumed the stroke.

"They would," Laura confirmed bitterly. It's a good thing she hadn't been popular in the first place, because she was about to become a public enemy in the mansion.

"Well. I wonder why?"

"Okay, just keep up. I'm only saying this once," Laura whispered, listening hard for anyone who may be around and hearing no one. She leaned towards Jean conspiratorially. "The other girls are extremely jealous that you have amazing red hair and say that you flaunt it in front of them, and so tonight when you go to sleep they're going to dye it this nasty shade of something I think you see in vomit. All the girls are in on it, and so is Kurt, but Rogue and Tabby came up with the idea and they're actually going to do it. The only reason I know about this is because I was in the room at the time and then they wouldn't let me leave because I'd be an escaped witness and tell you, like I am right now."

She took a deep breath. "So that's it."

Jean sat staring at her for a moment, while her brain caught up with what Laura had said, and then blinked and frowned slightly. "I didn't realize it had been bothering them so bad. I was born with hair this color, it's not something I chose."

Laura opened her mouth to say something, but Jean continued, tapping the brush thoughtfully against her chin, "But then I do sort of flaunt it. It's my best feature. You say they're going to dye it when I fall asleep?"

Laura nodded, narrowing her eyes and tensing slightly. Jean was getting calm, which meant she was coming up with a plan.

"If I don't fall asleep what happens?"

"You're going to fall asleep. You always fall asleep."

Jean sighed. "I can't help it; I'm always exhausted at night. Telekinesis is hard. Okay, so I'm going to fall asleep. What is this color, exactly?"

Laura described it to her. Jean winced. "They're that irritated about it? Okay. What could I…do…."

A wide, clever grin began spreading across Jean's face as she thought of something. "Dry your hair and find some shoes. We're running a quick little errand."

Approximately an hour later, the errand was almost done being run. Laura spun lazily in the chair next to Jean, slurping a super sized soda from the food court, pausing every fourth spin to mention what a dumb idea this was. Jean kept smiling but kept herself still as the last of the changes were made, and commented on how light her head felt as they paid and left. Laura said nothing, but her eyes kept getting drawn back to Jean's hair and evil grin. This was going to be a surprise for everyone, and none of the girls were going to like it.


	4. A Flipped Out Bob

Title: The Purging of the Red, Part 4

Fandom: X-Men: Evolution  
Characters: X23, Jean, mansion females

Prompt: # , Red  
Word Count:  
Rating: G  
Summary: The girls get tired of Jean lording her naturally luscious red hair over them.

Jean and Laura had decided spontaneously to camp out in the woods on the mansion grounds, and Rogue and Tabby were extremely irritated about this when they woke up the next morning, having never been informed that Jean had gone to sleep. They had fallen asleep waiting in Rogue's room, while Kitty had given up on trying to sleep in there in disgust and taken a pillow and blanket down to the couch in the rec room. Amara, Rahne, and Jubilee had given up a little after midnight and gone to bed.

When everyone had yelled and fought their way through their morning routines and went down to the kitchen for breakfast, they noticed that Jean and Laura still hadn't shown up again from their mysterious camping trip. Their bad moods had transferred to the guys, and by the time the adults had realized that something similar to a civil war was about to occur, Jean and Laura had snuck back inside and quickly finished setting up their plan.

First Laura meandered casually into the kitchen, acting as though nothing was amiss. She searched around for the orange juice, finding it in the cereal cabinet, and appeared to ignore the glares and looks of shock that she was receiving. Only after taking a long drink straight from the carton did she acknowledge the surprised mutants at the table.

"What?" she said.

"You little traitor!" Tabby yelled, slamming her spoon down in her cereal.

"What do you mean?" Laura asked, somehow keeping a straight face as she leaned against the counter.

"You told her, didn't you! That's why neither of you were around last night!"

Laura tried to look wounded and failed, instead looking like the predator she was. She tucked part of her new bangs behind her ear, and took another swig of orange juice.

"I found out on my own, thank you," Jean said, stepping around the door into the kitchen. "Telepath, remember? Laura just needed a haircut, so she got dragged into this just by being in the same room when the idea popped up." With that, she smiled sweetly and turned in a slow but smug circle so that everyone could see her hew flipped-out-at-the-ends, jaw-length bob and how nice it looked with her new sundress.

Rogue started turning red with either embarrassment or fury. Jean took the orange juice from Laura.

"They're called cups. Stop drinking out of the carton." She turned to Rogue and Tabby. "If it bothered you so much, why didn't you come talk to me? Dying my hair would have gotten you in a ton of trouble, but talking wouldn't cost a thing. It's okay though. I took a few liberties and the dye is now hidden somewhere safe. As for this-"she gestured vaguely at her bob, "-spring is so warm and my hair was so long that I decided to cut it and donate it. You know how I had to keep flipping it out of my face."

The girls were speechless, but Rahne and Amara looked like they were about to burst out laughing. Laura allowed a quick smile to herself and winked at Logan, who'd been watching the whole scene suspiciously from near Professor Xavier, who looked extremely amused and knew the whole truth.

"By the way," Jean said, turning suddenly. "Jubilee, these are yours. I'm sorry I took them, it was rude. Yellow isn't really a good color for me, but since you pull it off so well I had to at least try. I'll stick to my own accessories from now on."

"That's...fine," Jubilee said, taking her yellow sunglasses from Jean, trying to remember that Jean had actually pulled the look off extremely well and failing.

"Tabby? I'm sorry I keep using your brush. While Laura and I were out I bought my own and put your back. I even cleaned all the little hairs out. I hope that's okay."

"Um, sure. Whatever." Tabby tried not to look angry that Jean had twisted the situation.

"And Rogue?" Rogue stared resolutely at her food, trying to figure out whether or not Laura told Jean or if she really had known all along to come up with such an ending. "I'm sorry that I keep invading while you're in the bathroom. I bought a larger mirror and hung it in my room, so I don't need to barge in on you any more just to fix my hair."

Courtesy required Rogue to accept the apology even though she was pretty sure she didn't want to, and the situation appeared resolved. Laura managed to not get in trouble over this, Rogue and Tabby were thwarted but still, in a sense, got what they wanted. Laura finally got a haircut that didn't look so severe. And Jean didn't flip her hair anymore, deliberately at someone or not.

However the dye did end up getting put to good use, in the end. It was a temptation too great to pass by, so when a few weeks later after a fight between Tabby and Jean broke out, it didn't really surprise any of the girls when Tabby stomped into the kitchen with the ugliest imaginable hair color. Jean ended up cleaning the X-Jet for a month, but she maintained that it was worth it just to see Tabby get a comeuppance. Laura sat in a lawn chair underneath the X-Jet and kept her company.


End file.
